VIEW FROM THE STANDS

Last season was the best in club history! Our highest ever top- flight finish and points tally has set the bar high.

The big talking point is keeping our star players and manager. Yves Bissouma’s exit felt inevitable, but losing too many players could knock us off course. England’s poor Nations League showings led to calls for Graham Potter to replace Gareth Southgate.

This season will be different because we might turn a few draws into wins and finish even higher than 9th.

Our key player will be Moises Caicedo, our ready- made Bissouma replacement who oozes class. As his song goes: “He came from Ecuador, to win the Ballon d’or…”

I won’t be happy unless we beat Palace. We were lucky to get a draw at Selhurst Park last year and they got away with one in the home fixture. We still owe them from the season before.

Our most underrated player is Adam Webster. If he played for a bigger club, he’d be an England regular.

The fans’ opinion of the gaffer is extremely good, and very rightly so. A tiny minority of more dim- witted supporters have turned on him during the odd bad spell, but anyone with half a brain can see we have a special manager right now.

If he left, he should be replaced by Steve Cooper. I’d be amazed if we aren’t keeping tabs on him.

The player I’d happily drive to another club is Aaron Connolly, who features in the papers more for getting into trouble on nights out than for his footballing exploits.

The pantomime villain will be Wilfried Zaha. No explanation required!

We’ll finish around the same area as last year, barring any unexpected disasters.